Tag Archives: East Hampton
East Hampton fishing for stiffer laws against ‘organized crab crime ring’ stealing bushels of shellfish
Town officials are fishing for even stiffer laws in the war against “organized crab crime rings.” The tougher penalties are needed to turn the tide against “vans full of” out-of-towners bagging “bushels and bushels of shellfish out of Napeague Harbor” and other waterways including Georgica Pond, the town’s attorneys said. “They basically just start taking everything they can grab from the shallows and those two waters: from clams to scallops to conchs, hermit crabs, blue claw crabs. Pretty much grab any size of anything they can in sight,” said Chris Carillo, attorney for the town’s trustees. The night raiders employ a lookout to alert them to Marine Patrol officers and those who are caught don’t carry ID, and because it’s merely a violation, the offenders avoid being fitted for handcuffs, Carillo said. >click to read< 18:41
East Hampton Trustees Will Embark On New Legal Fight For ‘Truck Beach’ Access
The Trustees on Monday night authorized one of their consulting attorneys, Daniel Spitzer, to work with an attorney representing commercial and recreational fishermen in preparing a new challenge to an injunction that has since June prohibited any vehicles from crossing onto the beach east of Napeague Lane in Amagansett. “There are 25,000 residents of your town and every one of them has the right to use that access,” Spitzer said during Monday night’s Trustees meeting, via Zoom. “If you look at it in a smaller class, there are 1,802 people with fishing licenses who are being deprived of the right to use those fishing licenses on property that was expressly reserved for fishing.” >click to read< 10:40
In a bayman’s death is a lesson
On a summer day in August, a memorial was held at Green River Cemetery in Springs for a man named Dan King, who had died in North Carolina in April 2020. Dan grew up in the Springs section of East Hampton, where his family had roots going back three centuries to the first European settlers. Dan was a fisherman, specifically a member of the haul-seining community. That’s a method of fishing in which dories are launched from the beach into the surf and nets are spread out to encircle schools of striped bass that are then winched onto the shore. The Kings had done it for generations, as had members of the Lester family. >click to read< 13:09
An Organized Act of Civil Disobedience: East Hampton Baymen Take to ‘Truck Beach’ to Protest Court Ruling
East Hampton baymen and their supporters drove a caravan of 39 trucks onto what is popularly known as Truck Beach on Napeague on Sunday morning to assert what they believe is their right to use, and drive on, the ocean beach there. A panel of four New York State Supreme Court Appellate Division judges determined in February that the 4,000-foot stretch of beach is owned by landward residential property owners. Baymen had promised such action in the wake of a June 4 injunction reiterating the Appellate Division panel’s Feb. 3 affirmation,,, >click to read< 07:39
A Divided Community Speaks at Wind Farm Hearing
East Hampton residents crystalized their hopes and fears about Deepwater Wind’s proposed offshore wind farm 36 miles off the coast of Montauk in a three-hour-long public hearing at LTV’s Wainscott studio May 17. Their views highlighted a deepening divide within the community, with many saying the project is a necessary tool in combatting catastrophic climate change, while others worried that the price of the power from the project has not been disclosed, and many said that Rhode Island fishermen whose work was impacted by the company’s Block Island wind farm weren’t fully compensated for their losses, and were asked to sign non-disclosure agreements when they settled their case with the wind power company. >click to read<08:52
East Hampton wants more info, research, money from Deepwater
Even as Deepwater Wind indicated it was behind on its schedule to file more than a dozen permit applications for its South Fork wind farm, East Hampton Town board members and residents Tuesday doubled down on their requests for information, research and money to study and mitigate potential impacts of the $1.62 billion project. Deepwater has offered a list of “community benefits” to the town valued at hundreds of thousands of dollars. They include water quality improvement and fisheries research funds, as well as offering to bury power lines that are now on overhead lines. But the town and residents want more. >click to read<21:10
East Hampton Selects Captain Julie Evans to Represent Fisheries on Wind Farm Project
East Hampton Town’s Fisheries Committee has selected Captain Julie Evans, who has worked on commercial and charter boats out of Montauk for decades, to be the Fisheries Representative working for local fishermens’ interests with regard to Deepwater Wind’s proposed South Fork Wind Farm project off the coast of Montauk. Ms. Evans began fishing for striped bass commercially in 1975, but became a charter boat captain after the commercial striped bass fishery was put out of business by PCB contamination, she told the East Hampton Town Board at their March 6 meeting. She has also worked as a journalist and used her background in environmental science to help run ecotours.>click to read<14:54
East Hampton floats $15G loan to remove boat sinking in harbor
A private fishing boat that had been slowly sinking at the East Hampton Town dock in Montauk was hauled Monday after the town board picked up the $15,000 tab, officials said. The Sylvia S, a 63-year-old wooden dragger, was taken out of the water by Gone Fishing Marina in Montauk about two weeks after the vessel began leaking, Town Supervisor Larry Cantwell said. The insurance coverage on the 46-foot boat had expired.,,,Town officials had to step in to assure that the boat — which was being kept afloat by water pumps — would not sink at the town dock, where its owner was renting a slip, and become “even more of a concern,” Cantwell said click here to read the story 15:15
East Hampton Fisheries Advisory Committee Urge Study on Importance of Fisheries
Representatives of East Hampton Town’s Fisheries Advisory Committee this week again asked the town to help fund a comprehensive analysis of the socioeconomic importance of fisheries on the East End and reiterated fishermen’s concerns about the Deepwater Wind offshore turbine installation. The committee would like to hire Cornell Cooperative Extension to conduct the economic analysis, and its members are seeking participation from East Hampton and other local municipalities in order to raise the $100,000 needed to pay for it. Brad Loewen, the chairman of the fisheries committee, who is a bayman and a former town councilman, said the committee has also been examining how — or if — the State Department of Environmental Conservation considers potential detrimental effects on fisheries when assessing the impact of proposed projects, such as the offshore wind farm. With unsatisfactory responses so far from the D.E.C. to requests for information, the committee, which is working with John Jilnicki, a town attorney, may ask the town board to submit a Freedom of Information Law request for the needed documents. click here to read the story 08:52
